State failure and civil wars

Insurgent actors have long exploited broken social contracts in Africa’s weak democracies within their conflictual strategies. Post-9/11, many of Africa’s conflicts additionally tapped into radical Islamist ideologies and tactics first associated with extra-continental Salafi-jihadism. Upon closer examination, however, state failures that generated asymmetric conflicts since the Cold War era remain manifest in these so-called jihadist insurgencies. Focusing on Nigeria and Somalia, this chapter employs a Weberian framework to examine how conflicts with a religious undercurrent have undermined fragile states’ monopoly on violence and security provision. The Somalia case supports a shift from the Weberian state model in discussing the complex drivers of conflict and the roles of non-state actors in areas typically associated with the state and its institutions. Conversely, the Nigeria case is better examined from a Weberian perspective, which considers territorial control and regime ability to exercise writ over the contiguity of its borders as necessary markers of statehood.